Scouting For A Change
Warmth of friendship and enthusiasm for learning various life skills through fun and games mark the ongoing 8th National Scout Jamboree at Mouchak. The ecstasy and chatter of about 13,000 boy and girl scouts from across the country and abroad have broken the pristine silence of the Sal forest in Gazipur.
Bangladesh Scouts is holding its biggest domestic event at the National Scout Training Centre, about 45km northwest of the capital.
Scouts aged between 12 and 17 are living in tents they have made and eating food they cook on stoves lined in between the rows of green trees.
Resolute to achieve the highest mark and build a peaceful society, the boys and girls are participating in a wide range of activities that help elevate their physical, mental and spiritual selves and become good citizens.
Often they get injured while performing the challenging tasks, find it difficult to sleep in tents amid this shivering cold, but nothing can defeat their enthusiasm about the jamboree and the fun it holds.
“My hands have got sores during a course of Tarzan Swing, but this is nothing. I am participating in all the challenging courses,” said Afsana Akhter Ankhi, a student of Nababganj Pilot Higher Secondary School in Dhaka.
Afsana wants to become a model scout who can face any challenge in life and help people during any natural disasters, she told The Daily Star at the jamboree site on Tuesday.
Titled “Scouting for Change”, the jamboree of Bangladesh Scouts began on January 14 and will end on January 22. A few Nepalese and Indian scouts are attending the event as guests.
Bangladesh Scouts also facilitated participation of some street children and physically challenged youths.
Scouting, a worldwide youth movement, began in 1907 when Robert Baden-Powell, a Lieutenant General in the British Army, held the first scouting camp in England.
Scout units from school level, after succeeding in the district level contests, attend the National Jamboree held once in four years. This year, over 1,100 units, each comprising eight scouts and one scout leader, are participating in the jamboree.
They take part in 14 scouting activities–blooming, camp care, genius, hiking, global development village, fun and learn, crossroad, social awareness, friends and neighbours, my dreams, workmanship, scout skills, my vision, and campfire. The jamboree also features the central events–the opening and closing ceremonies and the grand campfire.
“Blooming is a very interesting challenge. In the morning, we go for jogging, march past, walking backward and various forms of aerobics,” said Nayeem Sarker of Rangpur High School. The scouts also attend the challenges of crossing difficult roads and roped bridge, bamboo bridge, jumping over high walls and many more.
Hiking is even more interesting where scouts of different units start from different points to gather at a common place, using compass, Nayeem said.
Besides, they go through tests of general knowledge, global challenges like impacts of climate change and scouts’ responsibilities, and learn life skills like carpentry, sewing and many more, he said.
“We are living like the poor to realise their hardship and prepare ourselves to help them,” said Mizanur Rahman of the same school. “We shall also create awareness about the impacts of climate change and other social problems that we learnt about here.”
The favourite challenge for Sabiha Khanam of Nababganj Pilot Higher Secondary School is the item called “Friends and Neighbours” where they make friends through games.
“I have got seven friends through the game and one of them is from India!” she said, excitement of the achievement glowing in her face. “We have so much loved the place and the friends that it will be very difficult to leave the jamboree.”
Mesbah Uddin Bhuiyan, national commissioner (programme) of Bangladesh Scouts, said, “We train the boys and girls in line with newer national and global challenges. We now prioritise issues like conserving the environment and growing patriotism among the scouts.”
The sub-camps at the jamboree have been named after the dying rivers of Bangladesh like the Halda, Dhanshiri, Punarbhaba and Ichhamati. “We want the scouts to know the rivers’ relevance to us,” Mesbah said.
Source: Daily Star
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